ARTICLES:The Story of a Death Row Inmate Who Wanted to Die

In 1996, Illinois Governor Jim Edgar commuted the death sentence of Guin
Garcia to life without
parole, even though Garcia herself had stopped fighting for her life. Garcia would have been the first woman executed in the U.S.
in twelve years. She had been convicted of killing the man who had physically abused her, but she had dropped her
appeals because she said she was done “begging for her life.” Chicago Sun-Times reporter Carol Marin followed Garcia's case after the commutation and recently wrote about the changes in Garcia's life. Marin told the story of Garcia's early life: her mother's suicide, sexual abuse by her uncle, becoming an alcoholic and prostitute by age 16. Last month,
Garcia received an associate degreee in liberal studies from Lake Land College at
a graduation ceremony at the Dwight Correctional Center. Fellow
graduates at the ceremony pointed to Garcia, now 49, as the reason they earned
their GED’s, professional certificates, and furthered their
education. They called her “Granny” and said she demanded they
straighten out their life as she led through example.

Ten days ago, I took a trip I wouldn't have predicted. This is a story about a
near-execution, a graduation and a decision by former Gov. Jim Edgar that has
delivered unexpected consequences.

It's a story about rising up and reaching down.

In January 1996, Guin Garcia, an inmate on Death Row at Dwight Correctional
Center in Downstate Illinois, was on the verge of execution.

Months earlier, Garcia, a 36-year-old convicted double murderer, had dropped
her court appeals, said she was done "begging for her life" and put the wheels
in motion for her death by lethal injection. It would mark the first execution
of a woman in the U.S. in two decades. It became an international story.

Garcia's biography wasn't pretty.

At age 2, she saw her mother jump out a window and die.

Her father split. She was reared by grandparents and an uncle. The uncle began
raping her when she was 7, giving her alcohol to calm her and shut her up.

Family members confirm the grandmother knew but did nothing.

By 16, she was an alcoholic and a prostitute. By 17, she was married and
pregnant.

Her baby, Sara, was not yet 1 when she suffocated her with a plastic dry
cleaning bag rather than face the prospect of DCFS taking Sara away to live
with the grandmother and the pedophile uncle.

She confessed, went to prison for 10 years, married one of her tricks, an
older man named George Garcia, who once, according to Supreme Court records,
genitally mutilated her with a broken bottle.

Drunk one night, she shot and killed George.

Her sorrow over Sara is something Guin Garcia lives with every day. She is not
sorry about George.

Fourteen hours before her scheduled execution in 1996, Gov. Edgar, who had
signed off on the executions of four men, suddenly stopped the wheels from
turning on this one. For a Republican who supported the death penalty, it was
not an easy decision. Edgar commuted her sentence to natural life.

Last week, I went back to the prison at Dwight. With a 3.95 "A" average,
Garcia was graduating magna cum laude from Lake Land College.

Dressed in caps and gowns, marching to "Pomp and Circumstance," 57 other women
received GEDs and certificates in computer technology, commercial cooking, dog
training and business management.

Friends and family filled the prison gym. Small children were in their Sunday
best, waving to their mothers. There aren't many happy days in prison, said
Warden Mary Sigler. This was one.

As one of the inmates rose to claim her diploma, a young man in a back row
proudly cried out, "That's my Mom!"

Garcia was last to be called up, the only one that day to accept a college
degree, an associate in liberal studies.

You might be asking, what's the point? Why waste tax dollars on a lifer?
There's an answer.

Graduates I talked to that day, including one who is 28 and has been locked up
since she was 15, told me the reason she earned her GED last year and got a
certificate in professional dog grooming this year was that Garcia, whom
younger inmates call "Granny," demanded that she straighten up and fly right.

Garcia's quest for education helped motivate hers.

That young woman -- a slight, pretty African American -- will get out in two
years better prepared to go forward because Guin Garcia, in life's depths,
somehow found it in herself to rise up and reach down.

Today, Garcia is 49, with no illusions about getting out. And yet, thanks to a
decision by a pro-death penalty governor to spare one life, new life has been
given.